Status credits from Partner airlines

[DWZ]

A few weeks back I was on QF10 going MEL (via DRW) --> LHR --> DUB on a Flex Economy fare on a single ticket.

The LHR --> DUB leg was on a BA flight (not Qantas codeshare).

Prior to buying the tickets, I looked at the Qantas website, and it said I'd get 12,400 points, and 140 status credits for both sets of flights. 12,400/140 is the same amount if you book MEL -> LHR alone, so seemed to suggest I wouldn't get any points or status credits for the BA flight at all. I figured this was because 12400/140 was the maximum you could get on a single ticket or something so didn't think much about it.



The fares were actually purchased via my corporate travel booking service (not the Qantas website) and was on a single ticket. Once I got back, I was happy to see I was credited the 12,400/140 for QF10, then got an additional 400 points and 20 status credits for the BA flight.

Anyway, so my question is why did the Qantas website initially suggest I wouldn't get those extra 400 points / 20 credits, and why would I have got them in the end? For example, was it the way my corporate travel booking service purchased the fare (e.g. the two flights weren't considered part of the same trip, even though they were purchased on the same ticket)?

 

[levelnine]

so my question is why did the Qantas website initially suggest I wouldn't get those extra 400 points / 20 credits, and why would I have got them in the end?

Because you could fill a Yellow Pages with the list of errors the Qantas website contains.

It does a particularly bad job at anything involving airlines other than Qantas.

 

[DWZ]

Well, that's a much simpler answer than I was expecting - yet explains everything. Thank you

 

[kangarooflyer88]

The rules with Qantas are as clear as mud: if you are travelling with Qantas on a revenue fare (i.e. no classic award seat) you'll earn status credits. Ditto if you are flying on a revenue seat with any OneWorld partner including BA, American, Japan Airlines, etc. It doesn't matter if you book these flights direct with Qantas or the airline operating the flight, you'll earn status credits. If you are flying on a closer partner like Fiji or Emirates, those generally must be booked direct with Qantas and must have a QF flight number (despite Emirates/Fiji/whoever operating the flight). Last but certainly not least is JétStar, Qantas' luxury flight brand. In general, a Starter Plus, Starter Max, or Business Max fare will attract Qantas status credits (Starter Plus = QF Economy, Starter Max = QF Economy Flex, Business Max = QF Business in terms of SCs).

Qantas computes status credits for any trip on a sector by sector basis. So for instance if you are flying from Sydney to New York (via Los Angeles) your status credits would be calculated for the Sydney to Los Angeles and the Los Angeles to New York sectors separately. The fare class and airline for each sector ultimately determines what status credits/points you'll earn.

Lastly and as others point out Qantas' website or points calculator isn't the end all be all. For instance, there are many destinations OneWorld partner Alaska flies which do not show up in the calculator, but if you were to take those flights you'd earn the status credits, based on milage/region. As always, the earning tables posted on the QF website under the heading Links to earning tables are your absolute best bet for computing award milage and status credits accrued. You can also use a tool like GCMap, to plot out how far you are flying and from that figure out how many status credits you'll earn per sector.

-RooFlyer88

 

[sudoer]

Ditto if you are flying on a revenue seat with any OneWorld partner including BA, American, Japan Airlines, etc. It doesn't matter if you book these flights direct with Qantas or the airline operating the flight, you'll earn status credits.

Not all oneworld partner revenue seats earn status credits. The deep discount booking classes on some partner airlines are ineligible to earn with QFF. (Cathay and Qatar are two which spring to mind, I'm sure there are others)

For QFF partner earn rules, the key is to rely only on the following pages:

https://www.qantas.com/au/en/frequent-flyer/earn-points/airline-earning-tables/earn-category-tables.html

https://www.qantas.com/au/en/frequent-flyer/earn-points/airline-earning-tables/partner-airline-earning-tables.html

The earn rates vary between partner airline and route, but these two pages should be all that one relies on to calculate how much they will earn. They trump everything else on the site including the status credit calculator and booking engine, which are full of missing routes.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Qantas *may* calculate status credits on a sector by sector basis. This applies to most flights by virtue of QF’s current network. But some flights, such as AU-Europe will be calculated as a single flight if the flight number doesn’t change. So AU-LHR via DRW on a single flight number for example will be one set of status credits and one set of mileage, based on the end-to-end distance.

In the new york example, pre covid when QF was still flying its own metal… if you changed flight numbers in LAX you got two sets of credits, if you were on the single flight number, just one.